$50M lottery family's privacy plan backfires

They beat the odds and won one of Canada's biggest-ever lottery prizes, but the Mayrhofers made a bad bet they could protect their identities.

In fact, by making every effort to stay private, they arguably invited more publicity than they would have had they just accepted their prize and said as little as possible.

Instead they found themselves on the front page of several of the English-speaking world's most-read websites. Britain's Sun wasn't concerned about the privacy issue — in Britain, lottery winners can choose anonymity — instead choosing the headline Family Waited Two Years to claim £25m lotto prize.

Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Australia also splashed the Mayrhofers' family photo in its "real life true stories" section, also choosing to headline the family's decision to wait so long to collect the prize.

Add the headlines from across Canada and the United States — where winners have the option of anonymity in six states — and it's clear the Mayrhofers life as "private" people has ended, at least temporarily, as news agencies wonder why they would have forfeited as much as $500,000 in interest.

Family patriarch Friedrich Mayrhofer was in good spirits, but sounded like he realized a mistake had been made when he spoke to the media this week.

"If I would do it again, I would come in more earlier ... but I took the family first, because money is nice, but the priority is my family," he said.

"I wish I would have come in earlier, because it was actually easier than I thought it was," he said to laughter.

It's a message to other winners, and a reminder that lottery corporations across the country are still reeling over allegations dishonest retailers won too many prizes, and will fight tooth and nail for transparency.